Secondary Menu

Digital Image from KPO – Comet Catalina

Comet Catalina through the KPO 18″ Reflector. Click for a larger image.

Finally a good capture of Comet C/2013 US10 Catalina! This was taken this morning at around 5:30AM EST through the main optics of the KPO Reflector. The comet did move along pretty well through the imaging session, so I had to do two stacks of the subframes, where one was aligned on the comet and one was aligned on the stars. I removed the comet from the star-aligned stack, and then layered them in PhotoShop.

It is easy to see the two positionally-opposed tails of the comet in this image.

Image Info: Canon 60D at the prime focus of the KPO Reflector. 27 frames of 60 seconds each (total integration time of 27 minutes), all frames at ISO 1600. Stacked in nebulosity, processed in StarTools, Layered and finished in Photoshop.